He froze.
‘It’s Sophie.’
He knew that. How could he not have known that when the sound of her voice felt like it was imprinted on the twisted spirals of hisDNA? It was just the last voice he had expected to hear so he’d been blindsided. Luc’s brain was trying to process how this was making him feel. Or maybe it was scrambling to find an emotional version of a protective shield. Finding words was nowhere near the top of the list, anyway. Maybe he needed to decide whether he wanted to say anything at all first.
But then he heard the sound of a tiny catch in a new breath Sophie was taking in and he knew instantly that this wasn’t easy for her. She was being brave and, out of nowhere, he knew how he was feeling, which was as unexpected as hearing her voice had been.
He was feelingproudof her.
They were – presumably – in different countries. So why did it feel as if they were both leaning on each side of no more than a closed door? As if they had their foreheads pressed to the thin barrier, rather than their backs?
It was Sophie who broke the silence.
‘Could we talk?’
8
Controversary over his art was nothing new for Luc.
He embraced it. It told him that people were looking. Talking. Thinking about things they might not have otherwise considered. A bride with her gown on fire, for example. Had she made a huge mistake and was stepping into hell? Would it make someone think a little more carefully about taking the monumental step of making a promise to love someone for the rest of their lives?
How could they possibly know, for certain, that they would be able to keep that promise?
They couldn’t, of course. That much was obvious by the statistics of broken marriages and splintered lives.
The plane Luc was on was banking, making its final approach to Nice airport. It was only a day since he’d taken that phone call from Sophie but he was on his way back to France.
He hadn’t had a choice, had he?
He had to put things right.
Who knew that embracing the shock of putting a bride and groom into a pile of trash could have the ripple effect of potentially destroying a destination wedding business?
He’d walked away from that particular destination wedding with the comfort of believing that Sophie Spencer no longer hated him with such a passion. How had he not seen that he might have given her a whole new reason to despise him?
Yet she had reached out, not in anger but to ask for his help. And, dammit, he couldn’t have lived with himself if he’d refused.
He was sitting on the left side of the plane, as he always chose to do, if possible, when coming into this airport. He loved the feeling it gave him, every time, to catch that first glimpse of the distinctive rock formations of thebaous– the mountains that towered over a chain of medieval villages including the most famous, St Paul de Vence. Like so many people born and raised in the South of France, even though it had only been his first five years, the outline of these flat peaks was a silhouette of home. There were four of them – the baous des Blanc, des Noirs, de Saint Jeannet and de la Gaude. The tallest, and most distinctive was that of Saint Jeannet and, only yesterday, Luc had learned that this was where Sophie had made her home and that gave the mountain a whole new significance.
Not that they were meeting in the village of Saint Jeannet. The neutral ground of Nice was far more appropriate because this was business. Or, hopefully, the potential salvage of a business.
The bump of wheels hitting the tarmac jolted Luc back to his contemplation of controversary. The trouble he had caused. Weddings in general and what the odds might be for the union between Zara and Joe to survive.
Luc was quite sure it was a matter of balance.
Love was far too small a word to cover countless definitions but just the right size to represent mere dots on a spectrum from total obsession to no more than a form of approval.
When French people plucked petals from a daisy, the accompanying chant was not merely about whether someone else loved you, or loved you not. In true French style, it was far more poetic and nuanced.
Il m’aime un peu,
Il m’aime beaucoup,
Il m’aime passionnément
Il m’aime à la folie
Il m’aime pas du tout.
